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If I were to say that my life is meant for something… It would be to change the world! Hah! who doesn’t want to do that? (At least I don’t want world domination)

Other than that, I’m sure not unlike almost everyone on the planet, I dream of (drumroll)….(badabada bada bum)

A luxurious life. (Tshhhhhhhhh)

Now luxury can mean different things. I definitely don’t want to be walking around on painful but oh so gorgeous nude pumps (okay maybe I want the pumps) But I do not want an LV bag, or a big ass bangla (bungalow) and a very expensive German gaddi. Nah not my cup of tea. I’d rather use that money to shelter homeless animals and old people. (I always think there should be a home for homeless people who in turn look after animals. But I digress)

What I would like (wishful thinking alert) is simply a small establishment in a beach somewhere, which hosts people and animals and maybe part of it could be a small quaint culture shop which could earn me and my partner enough to sustain ourselves. (also make films from time to time)

I would go swimming in the ocean/sea everyday. Ahhh. Bliss.

But to get to that, hurdles I must cross:

1. Lose weight (ugh)(to be fit enough for # 2.)

2. Getting a deep sea diver certification course

3. An establishment on a beachsomewhere

4. Money. To fullfil 2 and 3 (I had to have an expensive dream Dangit!)

I have been baking a film in my head for three years and apart from writing inconsequential notes to myself here and there which I keep loosing, its still in my head. Baking. Waiting for who knows what.

I’m not even sure what it’s about apart from characters and scenes that keep forming and dissolving in the abyss of my brain. Maybe I’m lazy. Maybe I wait for something to happen…maybe it even happens and I let the moment pass.

3 years. I feel scared to use the word wasted because then it will feel like its my fault that I let those moments pass….without being recorded. Without all that time meaning anything, because in life, everything should mean something, otherwise time is being wasted. Then there is that guilt for wasting all that time because it will slip away and nothing would have been achieved.

How does one start? Where does one start? I keep feeling like I need support. Maybe I do. Maybe I will get it if I just ask.

How does one (me, a straight, married woman) approach an LGBT topic? What right do I have? I imagine being asked. What right do you have to make LGBT films? You have not suffered anything.

What will you make it on? I am asked. I reply: The LGBT world is way too complex. There had to be a way to capture that complexity, those layers and layers of being. In a world where everyone has an opinion in Facebook posts, in twitter feeds, in group therapy, in best friends, in the straight crowd, in the queer crowd and everyone is wrong and everyone is right. It’s about labels, insecurities and identities, its about love, beauty and sex. It’s also about rights, lower caste, upper caste, race, colour, being black, white, brown, yellow, red and everything in between. Someone is always looking the other way. Othering. Look at those people. Look. Them. They. We. Us.

Us. Who is ‘Us’? This so called collective? Who is ‘them’? The ones who are not ‘us’.

At the end of the day it’s all about humanity. Sometimes I feel nothing matters. It doesn’t matter that weather you are queer or not. If you have a sex life or not If you want to be someone else or not We all have problems. Issues. Worries. Aspirations. Dreams. Needs.

You are human, and you deserve to give and recieve compassion and love no matter what.

Someone must have pulled the emergency chain for the train, I thought, as it stopped so suddenly. The sudden cessation of movement caused us all to fall forward.

Shaken, we stood up and put our heads out of the now motionless train’s windows. Most passengers crowded outside.

It wasn’t long before the police arrived on the scene.

___________________________________________

CHAPTER ONE

There was a loud blast, as the clattering train pulled into the station. It would be my first visit to the south of India. A very dear friend had invited me to spend two glorious weeks in Bangalore.

I clambered on to the now motionless compartment and flung my suitcase in. I muttered the number 23 to myself till I reached my birth. No one else had arrived yet. I shoved my suitcase under the birth and made myself comfortable near the window seat. It was hot and the crowd at Howdah station were not making it any better. I decided to get a cold bottle of water. By the time I returned there were two people already in the compartment; Guess I’d lost my window seat.

Both were men in their late 30’s. The one I sat next to, had thick glasses and was slightly on the heavier side, was wearing a grey t-shirt and dark blue track pants. He had a bald patch on his head, and looked as though he had been going through a lot of stress. Opposite him, was another man who looked relatively younger than his counterpart, was hidden behind the newspaper. He had sharp features, and muscular build, with a clean-shaven face. I could still smell the familiar old spice that lingered in the air.

At this point, two more people walked in dragging their noisy luggage behind them. One was an old man, with a young man who looked like his son who was carrying the suitcase, and the other was a young boy, about 18 years of age. Suddenly the whole compartment looked busy when the chaiwallahs came in clinking the glasses and the breakfast man asking everyone if they wanted veg or non-veg breakfast. I wished that the train would start.

A though my wish was answered, I heard a small screech as the train slowly started inching forward with a small jerk. Slowly enough, we were clattering along our way.The man next to me was about to introduce himself. Someone must have pulled the emergency chain for the train, I thought, as it stopped so suddenly. The sudden cessation of movement caused us all to fall forward. Shaken, we stood up and put our heads out of the now motionless train’s windows. Most passengers crowded outside.

It wasn’t long before the police arrived on the scene.

It appears that someone had been crossing the line, and had been struck by the train. It was just one station before my intended destination: Yelahanka, Bangalore.Someone remarked that the body was still lying there. I was about to have a look for myself when someone caught my hand firmly. It was none other than the fellow passenger with whom I had been talking throughout my four-hour journey from Kolkata.

“There’s nothing to see in that lifeless body. There is only a lot of blood and some mutilated limbs,” he said. “It would make you very upset.”

I hid my curiosity.

We talked ceaselessly as we traveled along. Sometimes about politics, sometimes about the present education scenario and sometimes about the high casualty rate in the traffic system. However, I couldn’t help my mind returning to that unseen body. Who had lost his precious life, I wondered. I was twenty-six years old. Death was something I didn’t want to think about; but it kept crawling back like a tireless snail determined to get to its destination.

Often, I find myself wondering; If I wasn’t me, then who would I be? The concept of being someone else is absolutely disconcerting to say the least, however, to experience being in another’s shoes literally, could be exciting, I suppose; but what do I know of shoes and such?

My experiences while shooting ‘Between the two‘ often gave me food for thought. While shooting, I experienced different red light areas in Bangalore, where women and hijra sex workers collaborated in surprising hospitality. They were all dressed well; sari’s impeccably tied or well fitted skirts or jeans on colourful tops. I, on the other hand, wore my old, faded yellow patiala, and faded white kurta. Clearly, that did not stop a middle aged army man on a bullet to stop and ask me my price for the night. Horrified, I was glued to the spot, unable to speak. My hijra friend came to my rescue and tried to ward him off with exorbitant prices. All I could do was slyly turn my camera on.

I came across this article today, and loved the content. Its written well too.

Men, according to prostitutes

Author – Chinki Sinha

Source – www.openthemagazine.com

January 9, 2014

” MUMBAI ~ The red of their lips was outlined in black. Kohl was applied carefully to accentuate the lips, give them shape. But they looked exaggerated. Comical, yet tragic. Eyes that looked as if they’d lost their way to sleep. But it is the lips that they protect the most. The body is up for sale. The black is ugly, they agree. But that’s to keep clients off kissing, and licking.

Sex workers in Kamathipura, Mumbai’s red-light district, say they don’t like kissing. It is disgusting. Their mouths stink and they always want more, they say. Business is down there, Puja says, pointing below her belly. That’s what she sells. “Do it, get your release, and off you go,” she says. “We don’t indulge men. They are chutiyas. Bhadwaas of the first order… randichod, they are.”

The women would like to think they are in a noble profession. Only the others look at them with disdain. They are saving other women on the other side from the vagaries of men’s desires. They are receptacles of all the world’s shit. Clients can piss in their vagina, shit in their bed. That’s when it turns ugly. But they are nonchalant about this ugliness. It is part of their world. They didn’t choose it, but now that they are here, they have to make the most of their time, and their bodies.

Men with hollow cheeks and empty eyes sniffing whitener lurk in the background, drinking toddy. Once they have made enough to buy prostitutes for a few minutes, they unleash themselves on them. They stumble in, list out their desires, shell out the cash, haggle with them, and ask them to fulfil their fantasies.”